It must be March

Though I don't need any excuses to paint Hares!

This fella was done as part of my DT work for Lou Withers & Royal Talens.

I covered an art board with mixed media paper and stamped the moon in vintage photo oxide.

I then sketched out the hare and went over it with Talens model powder (mixed with water) and built up the ears.

I coloured the moon with Ecoline pens and painted in the sky with Ecoline ink. Then with white gesso, starting from the moon and radiating outwards, I added the moonlight and flicked clean water over the sky

I then painted in the hare with a mixture of acrylics and Ecoline pens, finishing with a white gel pen for the highlights and whiskers and paynes grey shadows around the hare to make him pop. 

Hares and Graces

I've never been one to turn down the opportunity to try something new, so when some oddments of metal fetched up on my desk, I had to have a play.

This is part of a mixed metal pack from Peakdale Products, which includes copper, aluminium and pewter.

I'd just bought some of the MDF chunky ATC's from 'That's Crafty' and thought why not?

I started by measuring the area and then cut
a piece of tracing paper to the right size and sketched my design for the hare and moon.  Then I cut the metal to size and taped the tracing over the top, then taped the whole lot to an embossing mat.

I traced through the design with a ballpoint pen then removed the tracing paper and went over the design again with the pen.  Then I flipped it over and used embossing tools to push up the areas I wanted raised.  I repeated the process several times until I was happy.

I then filled the back with modelling paste to preserve the emboss (polyfilla is good!) and let it dry before going over with black acrylic paint and rubbing that back when it was dry.

The sides and top were done using the same method and a celtic border.

KISS

As in keep it simple, stupid!
                                         

The background was a happy accident when I was playing with my new Gel Press and Distress Oxides.  

I just smooched the oxides on the gel, spritzed with water and did a pick up onto mixed media paper.  I then stuck the paper onto a tag,

I loved it so much I didn't touch it for a week! And then my new IndigoBlu stamps arrived.  Well it'd have been rude not to....

I'd already fussy cut the bird for another project and he seemed to fit perfectly.

It's quite restrained for me but sometimes you just have to keep it simple.